This invention relates to a system for counting the number of times a prerecorded video cassette has been played, and more particularly to a system for recording, storing, and reading the number of plays of a prerecorded video cassette.
Rentals of prerecorded video cassette programs for use with home video equipment has become a large and growing business. Video cassettes with prerecorded feature length films are rented for a fixed period of time at a fixed rental fee. The cassettes can be played and replayed as many times as the consumer desires during the rental period. The problem arises that cassettes can be shared and viewed by many people at separate times during the rental period. Swapping of rented cassettes is common. In swapping, two or more consumers each rent cassettes. Each views one, and then they borrow the other's rented cassette and view the borrowed cassette. For the rental fee of a single cassette, then, the renter is able to watch two or more programs. The effect of this is that the rental agent and persons and business entities that have invested in the property in a film or program are deprived of royalties and income to which they are rightly entitled. Studios, producers, directors, artists and writers lose royalties.
Clearly, rental fees based on the number of plays of a prerecorded cassette program would be preferred to the current practice. A count of total plays during a period can benefit the distributor who rents to the retail rental agent, as well as benefitting the retail rental establishment. Today, however, there is virtually no way of telling how many times a prerecorded program has been played and so the fixed fee rental prevails. This unfortunate situation deprives the consumer of exceptionally popular films in that major studios have resisted making their entire libraries available for rentals on the current inequitable basis.
Much of the video equipment available today has a counter that continuously counts as the video tape is run, but a counter on home equipment contributes nothing towards solving the problem of the rental agent's or the distributor's determining how many times a program has been played. The problem has been recognized for some time now, but it has been proposed to provide mechanical counters in cassettes to count the number of times a cassette is played. Mechanical counters are easily disengaged accidentally or intentionally. If the count is visible, it invites tampering. Unless the count can be reset, the one keeping the count must keep a running tally for each cassette. Consequently, no adequate arrangement for counting plays of a rental cassette program has found its way to the cassette rental marketplace.